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 Ginger is our President Sheila Bishop's personal horse, and not a part of the rescue in the traditional manner. She does keep the rescued horses company, and assists in their learning by teaching them the ropes of both herd life and ponying them on trail rides.
She is a 21 year old Quarter Horse, and has had a long history of being founder prone. Sheila used to put shoes on her for the majority of her life, and the first 17 years or so she wore shoes half of the year. Sheila believed, like most people, that it was necessary- she didn't like putting them on her, and made sure she was barefoot in the wintertime, but put shoes on when they were riding in the summer.
Ginger has been at least a bit tender in her feet her whole life, regardless of being shod or barefoot, and Sheila tried many different things over the years to help her. Sometimes different treatments seemed to help a bit, but never enough to make her totally sound. She would be fine on dirt, but anything more solid would cause her to shorten her stride a bit, and always try to swerve back off the hard surface to a softer place. She never enjoyed going for long trail rides, and was slow compared to the other horses in the group.
In the last year, since Ginger has been receiving natural hoof care, diet, and exercise on a regular basis, she has gone from tender to totally sound. She now loves to go for rides, and is at the head of the group on the way out- a totally different horse! It took a few months for her hooves to grow out to a more healthy hoof shape, but since then she has been 100% sound. She can walk, trot, and gallop on both gravel and pavement- no problem, totally barefoot!! She still has some healing to do- her feet are nowhere near perfect yet- but we can only imagine how much better she can get from here. She seems to feel healthier also, she has more energy and runs around acting silly sometimes, which she never used to do. She was always rather lazy and just wanted to eat. She acts younger than she has in years.
 Macha also belongs to our President Sheila Bishop. She is a 4 year old mustang, and was adopted off the nearby Bookcliff Wild Horse Range when she was 2 years old. Sheila acquired her in April 09. She is still very green in her training, and has a lot of work ahead of her to become Sheila's next trail riding pal. While never having foundered in the past, her feet have become overgrown from traditional hoof maintenance, and will take a few more trimmings to get her beautiful natural mustang hooves back.
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